Democrats and Cannabis

By Marcia Blount and Ron MullinsJanuary 29, 2015

We’ve heard it said quite often - and
even said it ourselves - that you can't trust politicians.However,
that doesn't mean we can't work with them to help them understand our issues.If we do our jobs well and we finally get
them to understand our issues, then they might actually work in our interest - because
good policy turns out to be good politics in this case.If we really feel that the American
political system is so horribly damaged, we think it would behoove us to get
involved and find good politicians who will fix the system.We need to ensure they get elected instead of
keeping those in office that refuse help us. Admittedly, the Democrats don't have
the greatest track record when it comes to the support of Cannabis – medically
or otherwise.Certainly, back in the
early 90’s, many politicians were reticent to support even Medical Cannabis
since its first appearance on the political landscape in 1996.President
Bill Clinton (1993-2001) let the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) run
roughshod over the Medical Cannabis community in California shutting down as
many, if not more, dispensaries than President George Bush did later in a
longer span of time.And it is true that President Obama,
when a candidate, made the bold statement, “I'm not going to spend a lot of
resources on this”.However, he then left the DEA unchecked for 6
years while they again raided our Medical Cannabis dispensaries, attacked our growers,
stole our property through Asset Forfeiture, took away our children, and
imprisoned us.Obama's own Attorney General Eric Holder sat quietly
by, apparently, while US Attorneys attacked Medical Cannabis all over the state
of California in what was infamously called “The Crackdown” by California
Representative Barbara Lee in August of 2012.So, before you say it, we do NOT have
our heads in the sand.We are well aware
that the Democrats, with whom we are now working, have not always been working
with the Medical Cannabis community’s best interests at heart.However, as we have been working to educate
them, many Democrats are “evolving” on their views of Cannabis for recreational
use, and have an even greater evolution on Medical Cannabis.We are working hard to educate them on our
behalf and get them to replace their “Cannaphobia” with scientific knowledge
and moral understanding.Although a few Republican politicians
have “evolved” regarding Cannabis, many of them are choosing to do so for
“States Rights” reasons.However, since
many Republicans seem to hate science, they may not care much about scientific
research and what it is revealing about the many uses of Cannabis.Democrats, on the other hand, usually choose
to do so for “Civil Rights” and/or scientific reasons.They actually look at the scientific research
and studies, and they have discovered that Cannabis is not only NOT harmful, as
they have been led to believe, but is a helpful substance that can be used
safely by most of the adult population in our country.It seems the party of civil rights
used to be, during the time of slavery in our country, the Republican Party.They mostly supported the abolition of slavery,
and the Democrats at that time did not.But in recent years – at least since Franklin D. Roosevelt was president
(1933-1945), it is the Democratic Party that has shifted to becoming the party
that stands up for our civil rights.So parties do change.Remember, it was about twenty years
ago when some Democratic politicians started reaching out to the Lesbian Gay
Bisexual & Transgender (LGBT) community in an effort to find votes.These days, the Stonewall Democratic Club of
Sacramento has considerable influence within the Democratic Party of Sacramento
County (DPSC) since becoming a Democratic Club just 10 years ago.This is similarly mirrored across the nation
and within the Democratic Party as a whole.Let’s start with the progress right
here at home.In Sacramento we have a city council that is comprised
of all Democrats, with only two Democratic candidates competing for the
currently-empty seat.The Sacramento
City Council has, in the past 5 years, and with the help of Democrats like City
Councilmen Steve Cohn, Steve Hansen, and Kevin McCarty, completely updated its
views on Medical Cannabis and created a workable system for a handful of
dispensaries to operate and provide safe access to patients.Some
limitations have been placed on indoor growing, and outdoor growing has been
banned, so there is obviously more work to do.But we have been making steady, positive progress with them.However, in Sacramento County, the Board of
Supervisors has two long-time, law-enforcement-backed, Republicans, in the
person of Supervisors Susan Peters and Roberta MacGlashan, who wield their
power and influence to create a very sad situation in the county, despite
having three (less than effective for our issues) Democrats in office as
well. Sacramento County has a complete
ban on outdoor cultivation and dispensaries, and only allows for small indoor
grows. The Sacramento County Sheriff
Department has even used code enforcement to threaten and scare people into
pulling up their own plants.There is a stark difference in what is
happening in Sacramento City versus Sacramento County in regards to safe access of Medical Cannabis for patients.The Brownie Mary Democratic Club has
recently joined forces with other Sacramento Democratic clubs in the area, including the John
F. Kennedy (JFK) Democratic Club and the Green Democrats, to reclaim territories in the county. Along with working on ineffective Cannabis policies, we
will also be working together to turn back other pervasive and dangerous policies such as the selling
of Genetically Modified (GMO) Foods, Hydraulic Fracturing (fracking), the
militarization of the our police forces and police brutality, and other such destructive policies.This
is a very liberal agenda and it shows that there are serious changes coming to
the local Democratic Party.Hopefully,
with the help of the different communities including our own Cannabis community,
we can reclaim our city, county, and our country from the Republicans and their
extremely “Cannaphobic” policies.Statewide, we are seeing rapid changes
in drug policy as well.Proposition 47, a HUGE win for the Cannabis
community, recently passed in November 2014.It mandates that most non-violent drug possession charges will be
considered misdemeanors instead of felonies. It also permits reductions of sentencing for
anyone currently serving time in prison for any of these same non-violent offenses.
This initiative was supported by the Sacramento Democratic Party, the
California Democratic Party, many high-profile Democrats including Lieutenant
Governor Gavin Newsom and former State SenatorDarrell
Steinberg, and Democratic-leaning groups such as the American Civil Liberties
Union, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial
Organizations (AFL-CIO), American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees
(AFSCME), and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).Proposition 47 was opposed by the California
Republican Party and many Republican-leaning organizations such as the California District Attorneys Association, California
Fraternal Order of Police, California Peace Officers Association, California
Police Chiefs Association, California Retailers Association, and California
State Sheriffs’ Association.And don’t forget, in 2014, the
California Democratic Party added a plank to its Platform supporting “The
legalization, regulation and taxation of pot in a manner similar to that of
tobacco or alcohol".This plank
was adopted by a near-unanimous voice vote at the convention.At this same convention, Lieutenant
Governor Gavin Newsom’s rousing speech included statements such as, “How many
lives have to be derailed before we realize the learning curve (on the war on
drugs) is too slow and too costly?” and, “How long before we realize drug
addiction isn’t a crime, it’s a disease? There never was, and dare I say never will be,
a society free of drugs, as much as we’d like there to be. So it’s time for all of us to step up and step
in and lead once again in California.”The CA Democratic Platform additionally includes the Plank, we “Support
generally accepted holistic healing practices and alternative medicine,
particularly those areas licensed by the state such as acupuncture and medical
cannabis and utilized to relieve intractable pain without the side effects of
conventional controlled drugs”.In the California Legislature, more
efforts than ever have come through last year to create good policy regulating
the distribution of Cannabis statewide.This, when it is accomplished, will supposedly keep the Department of
Justice (DOJ) and the DEA from meddling with Medical Cannabis patients’
rights.These rights were established by
Prop 215, the “Compassionate Use Act of 1996, and Senate Bill (SB) 420, the
“Medical Marijuana Program Act”, sponsored by Democratic
Senator John Vasconcellos and signed by Democratic Governor Gray Davis.Unfortunately,
we still have a lot of work to educate and advise current Democratic
legislators regarding their forwarding of harmful bills like one presented by
lobbyist John Lovell (on behalf of theCalifornia
Narcotics Officers Association and other similarly-minded clients) now and in
previous years.Federally, progress has been slow but
steadily in our favor.A provision in a
House of Representatives bill in May 2014, voted in the affirmative by 170
Democrats and 49 Republicans, was carried over to the newly-enacted Federal
FY2015 spending bill.This provision
prohibits the U.S. DOJ - which includes the DEA - from using Federal dollars to
interfere with states where Medical Cannabis is legal.Recently, under Democratic President Obama,
Attorney General Eric Holder (also a Democrat) just clamped down on the
practice of Civil Asset Forfeiture (another horrendous practice that is part of
the “War on Drugs”) by barring any state or local law enforcement entities from
using federal law to seize a person's property without evidence of a crime.This is a MAJOR win!Although we've seen rumblings in
certain elections that some Republicans might support Cannabis - especially
where it is politically expedient and the candidates think there might be votes
to be gained - the evidence is strongly to the contrary.Look around.The first act of the new Republican-held Congress of 2015 was to try to
block the new pro-Cannabis law that was recently passed by the citizens of
Washington, DC.Most Republicans also support
the militarization of our police forces, and don't believe in Medical Cannabis, saying things like “Medical Cannabis
is a scam”.So, the proof is in the
pudding.There are many things happening here
in Sacramento, statewide, and nationwide that are transforming the
landscape.We believe that we are
dismantling, brick by brick, the wall that makes up the “War on Drugs”.Though it is not a perfect political party, we
believe that the Democratic Party is evolving more quickly on Cannabis issues
than the Republican Party, just as it did with LGBT causes.We don’t necessarily need to stop working
with Republicans, but we should start increasing our efforts to bring our
Democratic politicians along to our way of thinking.A freer society awaits.

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